Downtown Now: Doing Business

Downtown Now

City leaders envision a bustling downtown, one that is filled with residents who walk or bike to work, restaurants that stay open at night and on the weekends, a stronger business nucleus and mix-used buildings galore. But results are years away. This week, this blog spotlights people and places that are current examples of that perfect downtown.

On June 27, 2008, AT&T shocked the local business community when it announced it was moving its headquarters to Dallas. About 700 employees, including its top brass, no longer operate out of the tower at Houston and North St. Mary’s streets. The big blue and white AT&T logos so proudly displayed at the building’s entrance have been gone for some time.

While there are other examples of businesses either moving away from or deciding not to locate downtown, there are just as many that choose the central business district.

Especially small businesses.

Marketing/PR agency Creative Civilization has been a downtown citizen since 1999. The small agency of about 30 employees occupies the second floor of the Radius building, 106 Auditorium Circle. Its original location overlooked Alamo Plaza.

“When it came time for us to expand and look for new space, we never once thought of moving out of downtown,” said Al Aguilar, the firm’s chairman and CEO. “We’ve always been strong believers in the energy of our downtown.”

He’s not BS-ing. Six years ago, rather than move away from downtown, Aguilar and his wife Gisela Girard, president and co-founder of the agency, approached the owners of the 30,000-square-foot building  a structure built more than 60 years ago as a Studebaker dealership.

“What if we become the big anchor tenant, and downstairs you can have the nonprofit arts groups and then what you have is a creative compound,” Aguilar recalls as his pitch.

The Radius building is exactly that today. The San Antonio Youth Orchestras, Children’s Chorus of San Antonio, San Antonio Dance Umbrella, Alamo City Men’s Chorale occupy the ground floor, along with the for-profit Radius Cyber Cafe. Flowing from those tenants are regularly held concerts and performances at the Radius.

As the building’s anchor tenant, the agency occupies the entire 15,000 square feet of the second floor. This includes a kitchen and rec room complete with a foosball table, two refrigerators and cafe-style circular tables. If they need a nap, employees can walk upstairs to a small lounge area.

Another benefit, especially for working downtown, is parking. Two lots provide plenty of parking for its employees.

“We have reserved parking for our visitors on our back side,” Aguilar said. “And then we have this other parking lot adjacent to us. We have ample parking for our area. We are steps away for building.”

Then there’s the commute. Most people would agree, getting in and out of downtown is a piece of cake.

“Originally, when we were going to move down here, we worried about the commute,” said Paul Young, executive vice president of Gunn Automotive Group. “It’s actually pretty easy to get downtown.”

Gunn’s corporate headquarters are located at 227 Broadway at Pecan Street, a block from Travis Park. The company, which occupies another building next door at 213 Broadway, acquired the property in 1996.

Young said logistically, operating downtown makes sense because it’s centrally located relative to its many dealerships across the city.

“We are no more than 20 minutes away from getting to any of our locations,” Young said.

Gunn’s downtown employees soak up the downtown lifestyle  walking to various restaurants for lunch and taking in cultural activities such as Jazz’SAlive at Travis Park, Young said.

Gunn, too, has its own parking for its employees. Even though its headquarters are located on a block many would consider shady, Young said there haven’t been many incidents in its 13 years.

“Sometimes, the Monday after the Jazz’SAlive festival, there’s some trash in the parking lot, but we’re used to that,” Young said. “The downtown Amigo guys are just fantastic. They come down through here regularly and we get to know those guys.”

The desk arrangement at GDC is a bit unorthodox.

Dealing with the riffraff has been a challenge for PR firm Guerra DeBerry Coody. But they’re dealing with it.

“We did have an instance where at lunch time, when there weren’t a lot of people here, we had somebody come in and took the elevator up to the second floor and was rifling through purses and taking cell phones,” said Trish DeBerry-Mejia, president of GDC.

A video camera was installed at the door and a keypad at the elevator. Employees are encouraged to walk back to their cars in pairs or groups.

GDC began about 15 years ago, first operating out of a three-building compound at 411 Sixth Street. It stayed there about five years before moving to its current location at 122 E. Houston St.

With the move, workers were in the heart of downtown, and were then able to walk to lunch and enjoy the best downtown has to offer.

There was one drawback: “We had free parking over there,” DeBerry-Mejia said. “That was one of the things we gave up.”

Unlike Creative Civilization and Gunn, GDC does not have its own parking lot. Employees park at the lot kitty corner to the building. Some park at the Central Library’s lot. Others take the bus to work. A lot across the street is being turned into an Embassy Suites.

Despite these challenges, DeBerry-Mejia said GDC is a downtown company.

“We did not want to be in Loop Land,” DeBerry-Mejia said. “We did not want to be north. We wanted to be a business resident downtown.”

Retaining these businesses, as well as recruitment, is one of the functions of Centro Partnership, a public-private entity the City Council approved the concept of last year.

There are some encouraging signs, according to Kim Gatley, vice president and director of research at NAI REOC Partners.

Owners are putting more money into their buildings, upgrading them, trying to make them more attractive to potential tenants. A good example of this is the renovation of the Tower Life Building.

Downtown building owners are in a battle with the suburban owners for tenants. As a result, downtown owners are quoting much cheaper rates than what has been the norm.

“That’s a fairly recent development that the tide of change has really recently occurred,” Gatley said. “That is direct evidence that the landlords are consciously trying to compete with those suburban properties.”

There’s something to be said for available housing, too. The commute and proximity to work is a huge factor in where a company chooses to locate.

In 2008, in preparation for the Downtown Alliance’s annual State of Downtown luncheon, Cambridge Realty Group managing principal Gardner Peavy explained one aspect of refining company Tesoro’s decision to move from its U.S. 281 location at Jones Maltsberger Road even more north.

“In that case with Tesoro, we mapped out where those executives lived and they were further north than their Basse-(U.S.) 281 headquarters, which explains why there was pressure to move north than downtown,” Peavy said.

“There are obviously multiple other variables on that decision but it’s just one consistent trend you see with office space.”